To spend $3,600 dollars on coaching?
Developer · Orange County, CA · Member since 2019 · 80 posts · 53 votes
I have been asked to become a student of an investor who retired off of his rental income in 10 years. it is a 6 month coaching program but is going to cost me $3600. can i get some advice? thoughts?
I currently do not own any rentals
What are you getting for the money? I suspect you can learn everything they offer by reading BP and some good books.
First and foremost, people, generally, don't value what they get for free!
And I wouldn't sign up for that "But Why?!" class, I don't know why it is just the way it is.
Listen there is a price to pay in life, and my favourite bit I like to add is: and there is no discount, we all have to pay THE FULL PRICE (price is not necessarily money)
What many people are forgetting here is that the best athletes in the world need coaches (not gurus). I've used a mentor, and he is phenomenal.
Many go to school or be an apprentice to learn a particular skill, why not do that for your success journey!
If anyone here thinks that those who we aspire to be in this game of REI got there all by themselves without some sort of coach or mentor, then that person hasn't been doing this for long.
Whether or not we want to believe it or not, asking for help on your journey isn't a weakness but a strength and it is critical to differentiate a coach or mentor from gurus. Gurus never do deals, but coaches are actively doing deals.
My $0.02 🤗
@Shane Elias-Calles No prob you got this! I bought my first triplex at 25 years old with little to no guidance, and I was not aware of BP at that time. I just did my homework lol and the rest was history. I know you mentioned this guy helping you building up your portfolio faster but you only have access to him for 6 months. Consider how you can leverage, get creative and remember Rome wasn’t built in a day. :)
@Kyle Nelson although a genuinely great thought/approach BUT This “trainer”
Is obviously running a business and if he’s a good business man there’s no way he’s give you his product on consignment... that would be like going to an enrollment officer at a college and saying “yeah let me try the four years out and if I graduate and make a lot of money after I will pay you for the knowledge I gained, but if I only get a mediocre job, you get nothing ” business is business the “trainer”
Is providing a service, either you take it or leave it, the ability to choose is a beautiful thing.
I wouldn't do it. I fail forward.
@Shane Elias-Calles I look at it like this, this information is all out there free, but it is unorganized. Many folks hate on the idea of a paid coach, but listen to the BP podcast with Gabriel Hamel.. Brandon Turner has a business coach and fitness coach, all the same information is out there for free and he uses a coach. Personally, I feel many discount coaches on this forum because there are bad ones out there.
I suggest researching the coaching being offered and ask for previous clients.
Hi Shane,
$3,600 is not a lot of money (in a real estate transaction), but right now it is to you (which is probably why you asked about this).
So the question seems to be, how much money (and luck) do you need to have (under this business plan) to make 1 purchase happen, and then to make 2 purchases happen, and then 3 etc...
Do you have enough money (and credit) to buy (1) buy-and-hold investment property, and then have enough cash reserves to run it, and make it likely you will not lose it to foreclosure?
If you do, where will the money for purchase number (2) come from?
Some people have access to more cash than others, and some have more cash on hand than others.
The cash you can "Throw at this" will probably figure into it, unless it's some type of high risk strategy where you have to do X a lot times in hopes of getting result Y (in which case it's more of a gamble than an investment).
And as Kenny Rogers said in "The Gambler", "You never count your money when your sitting at the table".
But if you are gambling, then realize that sometimes gambles pay off and sometimes they "Crap Out".
Good Luck!
@Shane Elias-Calles I’ve spent about that on coaching. I think with one on one time it’s worth it. I mean I don’t regret my spend so it’s a personal choice. Ive done men only coaching for general life and goal stuff and a Bootcamp from Cardone in Miami. Cardone’s was definitely more fun because it was live
@Shane Elias-Calles
Part of the guru business model is selling coaching. If they have truly “retired on passive income” they wouldn’t be traipsing across the country selling coaching programs. Hard pass on the principle of it.
@Shane Elias-Calles I am going to pick apart @Alexander Felice’s comment because I think it is a very common belief that I see over and over again here on BiggerPockets. His words are in italics. My words are bolded.
How much are you networking locally? How much time have you spent learning yet.
I am in agreement with these questions. There are a lot of things that you can do to start learning and networking so that the time you spend with a mentor or coach can be the most effective and efficient as possible. If you have the greatest mentor and coach at baseball in the world but you don't know anything about the sport then you will be taking that mentor/coaches time to first teach you the basics that you could have easily learned on your own or by watching some baseball games or joining a local league; and that is probably not the the best use of the mentor/coach's time.
Networking is also invaluable. getting to know other people who are doing what you want to do is, in my opinion, one of the greatest ways to become more familiar with it and learn the language of the trade.
There is a big ramp up in education before you feel comfortable with real estate, but it's NOT complicated.
Just like in most any profession, there is a lot to learn in real estate before you get comfortable with it and at the basic levels it is not complicated. But just like college courses in math, the upper levels become much more complicated. If you want to buy a rental off the MLS at market value and put 25% down (because it is an investment property) and hope that you screen the tenant well enough to get a good one who will not trash your investment, and hope that you have done the numbers well enough to get at least an 8-12% return that won't be eaten up by every turn over or by capital expenses over time, and you want to take a few years of trying to figure all of that out, then yes, it is not that complicated.
However, if you want to use more advanced strategies that require much less of your own money but have much greater returns such as 1) subject to, 2) lease options, 3) trading properties, or 4) buying a 3-acre property where there is a manufactured home on it where the seller does not have a title to it so you are getting it for 40% of the value and then getting a bonded title and putting 15k in to fixing it up and creating 120k value within a short period of time, then yes you will need education (preferably someone to walk you through the process) to be successful at these types of strategies.
There is no secret to real estate, there is very little a coach can teach you that you can't learn for free online. Most people just want it to go FAST and they get lured into these programs. Unfortunately real estate is kind of a slow game for pretty much everyone.
I agree that there is no secret to real estate. But just as I experienced when I took calculus at the university, there is an entire world of math out there that I didn't even know existed. And just because I have been using math my whole life, I had no idea that numbers could get so complicated and if I didn't understand these advanced concepts than I would fail at that high level.
Also, many people do want real estate to be a faster vehicle to wealth than what they are doing currently. Otherwise they would just follow the Dave Ramsey approach and live on rice and beans for years and years and save their way to financial peace by the time they are 65 or 70 so they can finally live "like no one else." Real estate can be a much faster vehicle which is why I think people choose it over other things. And it definitely does not need to be a slow process.
I would spend a lot of time meeting your local investors first, and spending time networking on BP and exhaust the free resources as much as you can. These paid-for guru's wouldn't be selling these programs if they were making real money in RE.
If their real estate was going so well they would spend time on it making money, instead they prey on the naivety of beginners
I agree, I think it will be super helpful to get familiar with real estate through networking or attending meetups in your area. However, besides the forums, podcasts, and webinars here on BP and other websites, youtube, and podcast platforms, all of the other things I know of have costs associated with them (books, audiobooks, the large REI meetings and meetups).
The last comment is very common, yet very incorrect. There are gurus that I know that have millions and millions of dollars in real estate, they write books, they speak at seminars, they create charities, etc. And they are gurus. One in particular that comes to mind is Robert Shemin who wrote the book How Come That Idiot's Rich and I'm Not? He owns millions of dollars in real estate and he is a guru and an awesome speaker and presenter. He is very good and knowledgeable about real estate and about mindset and helping people move from a stuck position to an unstuck position to make goals for themselves that are much higher than they originally thought they could achieve. Being around him is motivating.
Over the last year of acquiring properties we had to slow down our personal purchases because the bank wanted to see next year's tax returns before continuing to give us loans. So instead of continuing to just buy properties for ourselves and risk becoming over leveraged until the bank loans come through, we started to help people in our private money lending group acquire under market properties themselves, help them rehab the properties with our subcontractors, set them up with tenants on lease options using forms prepared by lawyers to make sure everything is done correctly legally, and we walked them through the whole process for a fee. @Ali Boone calls this the BRRRRkey model. These investors are able to get a property that is tenanted, cash flowing at higher than average market rates, and they are able to step into 10-15% equity right off the bat increasing their net worth. We have done this a handful of time for a 5-6k fee. The investors are happy with it, We are happy with it because we are able to continue to use our system that generates good deals rather than just stopping and waiting 4 or 5 months for the bank to come around, and the new tenants are happy because they get a house to set down roots and work towards home ownership.
So here is a very clear example as to why someone who is doing well with their own real estate would start to coach others in real estate.
(By the way, this is not an offer that I am hiding in this post for people to reach out to me and ask me to coach them in real estate. We have a group of investors who lend us money on our deals and earn interest on their money while they get to learn our process of investing. Those are the people we coach through how to do this if they want to learn, but not anyone outside that group).
In my opinion, the top performers have mentors and coaches.
It would be great if after 6 months you could have access to him as well; maybe spread it out over a year. $3,600 is not that much and you will make that back on your first deal. 1-on-1 mentoring speeds up the process but you need to practice what they say and have the time to invest. I would do the mentoring if you feel it can greatly benefit and jump start your career. I take golf lessons; I also watch golf YouTube channels. Why not just watch YouTube videos? I want to get better this decade and 1 hour with a seasoned professional saves me hours of watching YouTube however; it is really best to do both. Lessons without practicing is worthless.
@Shane Elias-Calles
Part of the guru business model is selling coaching. If they have truly “retired on passive income” they wouldn’t be traipsing across the country selling coaching programs. Hard pass on the principle of it.
Not to be confrontation here at all, but I want to ask you a question, no two questions:
Does Grant Cardone offer coaching programs?
Does Robert Kiyosaki offer coaching programs through his Rich Dad Poor Dad companies?
Are they both making money from Passive Income? (bonus question)
I have been asked to become a student of an investor who retired off of his rental income in 10 years. it is a 6 month coaching program but is going to cost me $3600. can i get some advice? thoughts?
I currently do not own any rentals
Instead of dropping $3600 on coaching, I'd suggest investing the equivalent of the $3600 in terms of the value of your time learning everything you can from freely available resources. So, for example, if your time is worth $50 per hour to your current employer, then go invest 72 hours -- time it -- listening to real estate podcasts, reading real estate books at your library, reading real estate blogs, reading the BP forums, etc.
I've never personally listened to it, but many folks here swear by the BiggerPockets podcast. I've heard good things about it.
I'll also give a plug for two podcasts produced by people I know, that are very well done, and very educational. One is the Nomad Real Estate Investing Podcast, the other is the Denver Real Estate Investing Podcast. In particular, I'd highly suggest the June 20th episode of the Nomad podcast, which explains the Nomad strategy for acquiring rental properties. It's the strategy I follow, and mathematically it's an amazing model.
@Shane Elias-Calles the most value will come with accountability provided. As mentioned you can learn most everything else for free.
@Shane Elias-Calles focus on is 1> Will the complete loss of 3600 cause ACTUAL pain (aka sacrifice food ,your home etc,kids needs etc) 2>What is the true reputation of the person providing the training. for example you spend 3600 and you make 10k...power to you!..You spend 3600 and make 100k super power to you!..
save your money and self learn... there's very little a coach could provide that you cant find freely available and understandable online and then you can always ask questions on platforms like this.
@Shane Elias-Calles
Hi Shane, I think if you started by going regularly to meetups and networking you’ll find lots of mentors for free. I’m not appointed to paying a coach, but I think this is pretty preliminary things to learn. Good luck!
@Shane Elias-Calles The advice I always give newbies is flip cars/trucks first. It's not popular advice but it's the best I can give. The process (buy low and remodel) is identical. I've personally done both.
Both you have to manage a remodel project with subs. And you'll run into the same problems with both. Not only will you have the advantage of learning "on the job" but you should make some good profit, while flipping cars/trucks, to apply to buying more rental properties once you start.
Good luck,
I have been asked to become a student of an investor who retired off of his rental income in 10 years. it is a 6 month coaching program but is going to cost me $3600. can i get some advice? thoughts?
I currently do not own any rentals
Hey, Shane...
Real talk: I don't like it. It's not hard to learn about acquiring rentals on your own. I don't understand why the hell coaching would cost $3,600. I get that an investor's time is valuable and all that, but everybody knows that success depends on the person being taught. If you're not disciplined enough to learn on your own, you are (with certainty) throwing your money away. Whoever that "coach" is knows damn well he can't make you be successful, but he'll be happy to take that money, though.
I'm as sharp as a spoon and I have done a little bit with what I got. Again, this isn't hard, and there are too many sources of free information. Save your money, brother.
I haven't gotten a coach for real estate but I did get one for my marketing business. I doubled my revenue because of it. Agree you can learn a lot on BP. I hired my coach because I had been following him on social media for years and knew that he knew what he was talking about. Would check his references and what he has accomplished in real estate to see if it's worth it.
The statement not to be confrontational followed by rhetorical questions hardly seems non confrontational. Additionally, I think focusing on the average and not the outliers of the entire coaching mentorship services subset of real estate would yield far better advice for Shane in this particular thread.
The majority of the coaching/mentoring that I've been pitched were going to charge a fee to capitalize their own business on the reduced margins they will offer the end investor and I've been to plenty of events where the "great buys" were less than half of the returns I was able to find right down the street, just not flipped by the right contractor or not listed by the right agent.
This is why I believe coaching and mentorship services that are worth the money are the exception and not the rule.
@Shane Elias-Calles Proceed with caution and ask the questions you are hoping to have answered here first. My phone and email are both on my profile and there is far more experience than I have just as willing to help you succeed right here.
I have been asked to become a student of an investor who retired off of his rental income in 10 years. it is a 6 month coaching program but is going to cost me $3600. can i get some advice? thoughts?
I currently do not own any rentals
My general requirement for "coaches" is that they must *NOT* demand any payment up front - they must be willing to teach me how to make the money they expect me to pay them. If they can't / won't, then they're not the coach that I - or anyone else, in my opinion - need.
There's no location for you in your BP profile; So, I can't offer much more than that right now.
Look around your location - Meetups, other event - for opportunities to network with local active investors.
There is some on-line, on-demand education you can get which has lifetime access for that money and still have $1,100 left and, depending where you are, you may have a local community of students who are actively investing, just as you would find at a REIA club with whom you could network and help expand your REI circle.
My $0.02 ...
Mentors who have been there, will help to a certain degree just to pay it forward.
I don't believe in "Gurus" or anyone else who thinks so highly of themselves to charge that much to someone just getting their feet wet, is not someone I would want to hang around with period.
You can educate yourself for so much less and BP is resourceful in so many ways!
Good luck!
It absolutely amazes me how people sell their expertise to other people and they're not even that successful. Save your money, hustle and you'll learn more than you will from some stupid mastermind or _____ coach.
I don't like taking advantage of people (which is what I think most of these people do, some are probably worth it) but when I see mindless people just handing over thousands of dollars to people because that person is a good self-promoter, it makes it tempting.
@Shane Elias-Calles I watch him on YouTube but no I would not pay anybody to coach me